Rest of the Crete. 16.6-24.6.2019

Rest of the days I mostly suffered severe leg pain and did not really concentrate on birds. I had nice numbers of raptors from our patio and few short walks around was god for me. Last week we were alone with my mother so less helping hands with the kids etc.

On 17th we visited a botanical gardens of the Crete and it was one beautiful place full of butterflies and some birds too. Loads of singing Blackcaps, few Buzzard and blackbirds. Not anything really interesting, but the concert was impressive.

A lifer, Southern Comma, Polygonia Egea.

Two-tailed Pasha, Charaxes Jasius. 

Old-world Swallowtail, Papilio Machaon.

Papilio Machaon 

On 18th I was watching some buzzard from our house and suddenly noticed a bigger raptor with them. I ran to my telescope and shit, the bird was Bonelli´s Eagle! I ran again, this time to crab my camera, and I managed to get some very poor pictures where you might see a Bonelli´s Eagle. Anyway, it was very nice bird and quite rare in Europe, so I was glad.
Many nights we heard European Nighjahr and Eurasian Scops Owl song together!

Distant Common Buzzard. 

Distant Bonelli´s Eagle on the right. 

On 22nd we made and family visit to Agia Lake and I had Common Nightingale, Some Mallard looking ducks, Common pochard and some beautiful dragonflies.

Southern Comma, Polygonia Egea again. 

Turtles babies at the lake. 

Second calendar year Larus Michaelis. 

Violet Dropwing, Trithemis Annulata.

Also some random photos here.

Balcan Green Lizzard at our patio. 

Turkish Gecko on our house wall. 

Dysgonia Algira.

Mantodea Sp. Presumed male, cause the size. 

Sardinian Warbler was one of the most common birds in Crete. Here is male. 

During the last week we also noticed a great sight from the space. Normally this time of the year in Finland you really can´t see any stars cause the sun doe not really set there. In Crete we noticed a bright star which revealed as a Planet Jupiter! I was really interested about the Plane and when I looked it with my telescope I noticed four smaller dots.

Io, Europa, Ganymedes and Kallisto, the four biggest moons of Jupiter. 

Our moon was full and beautiful. 

So, we left Crete behind at 24th and with many memories I really can recommend the place for birdwatchers and other tourists. I had about 50 species without doing anything hardcore but Samaria, so in a week I guess you can reach to a nice number of species.
Stalos Hills and our villa from Panos Stalos suites was very good. Own pool with kids were super nice.
Thanks to my sister, brother and mother for company and Special thanks to my family Sanni, Vilma and Julius for this vacation.
Our flight was little bit delayed so we arrived to our home at 3am with taxi and I had to twitch again without any sleep. More of that later.

-Tom